THE MINERAL INDUSTRY OF TEXAS 
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site in the Bayport industrial district, 20 miles southeast of Houston. Mayco
Oil & Chemical Co., a new entry in the Gulf Coast chemical industry,
will build a plant in the Bayport area. The company, headquartered in Philadelphia,
produces sulfurized fatty bases, oils, additives, and leaded compounds. Mobil
Chemical Co. added a metatoluic acid unit to its Beaumont complex. The acid
is a petrochemical intermediate used in the manufacture of pharmaceuticals,
plasticizers, and coatings. Petro-Tex Chemical Corp. completed a 45million-pound-per-year
neoprene rubber unit and was building a 45-million-poundper-year chloroprene
monomer unit at its Houston chemical complex. Rohm & Haas Co. was expanding
acrylate monomers capacity of its Deer Park unit by 70 percent. Shell Chemical
Co. was adding to its Deer Park chemical complex with a 1-billion-pound-per-year
ethylene plant and a 150-million-pound-per-year isopropyl alcohol and acetone
plant. 
 Sinclair Petrochemicals Corp. was installing a new unit at its Channelview
plant to produce 35 million pounds of isophthalic acid and 35 million pounds
of metaxylene Isophthalic acid is used to make polyester plastics, fibers,
film, and vinyl plasticizers. Metaxylene is used to make isophthalic and
metatoluic acids, polymers, and perfume musks. SinclairKoppers Co. completed
a 500-millionpound-per year ethylene plant at its Houston complex. The unit
will assure adequate feedstock for expanded polyethylene resins and ethyibenzene
production at its Port Arthur plant where* a 350-millionpound-per-year ethylbenzene
unit was added. The new ethylene unit is adjacent to the company's styrene-monomer
plant and a Sinclair Refining Co. refinery. A 100-million-pound-per-year
paraxylene unit and a 50-barrel-per-day orthoxylene unit were being built
at the Corpus Christi refinery of Suntide Refining Co.; production was scheduled
for early 1968. Tenneco Manufacturing Co. was raising acetylene capacity
of its Houston petrochemical complex from 85 million to 110 million pounds
per year, vinyl chloride monomer capacity from 200 to 255 million pounds
per year, ammonia capacity from 365 to 600 tons per day, and methanol capacity
from 38 to 60 million gallons per year. A 1,500ton-per-day ammonia plant
was being built at Texas City by Tuloma Gas Products Co. 
Union Carbide Corp. was building a 1.2billion-pound-per-year ethylene plant,
a 700-million-pound-per-year ethylene-oxide plant, and a 50-million-pound-per-year
vinyl acetate unit at its Texas City complex and expanded polyethylene capacity
of the Seadrift plant by 125 million pounds per year. 
 Pipelines.—A number of important gas pipelines were built or under
construction in 1967. A 164-mile pipeline from Houston to Nacogdoches County
will deliver 200— 250 million cubic feet of gas per day from Humble's
King Ranch gas plant to industrial customers along its Trawick pipeline system
in East-Central Texas. A 369mile, 30-inch pipeline from Kermit, Tex., to
Beaver, Okla., was completed by Northern Natural Gas Co. The line will connect
reserves of the Coyanosa, Gomez, and Reeves fields with the company's main
pipeline at Beaver. The company will also build a 260-mile pipeline connecting
New Mexico reserves to its Amarillo-Chicago main line at a point in Moore
County. Houston Natural Gas Corp., through its subsidiary Houston Pipe Line
Co., completed a transportation agreement with Mobil Oil Corp. to deliver
in excess of 100 million cubic feet per day to Mobil's Beaumont operation.
A 98-mile, 20-inch pipeline from Falfurrias in Jim Wells County to Normanna
in Bee County will increase gas deliveries of South Texas Natural Gas Gathering
Co. with Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp. (Transco) by 115 million cubic
feet of gas daily for a 16-year period. This contract raises South Texas
deliveries to Transco to 65 million cubic feet, with peak deliveries of 385
million cubic feet. 
 A 238-mile, 8-inch pipeline between the King Ranch and Clear Lake gas plants
of Humble Oil & Refining Co. will carry 200,000 barrels per day of ethane
from these operations to a 6-inch line to the ethylene units of Phillips
Petroleum Co. at Sweeny, Tex. A second 30-mile products pipeline and a gas-extraction
unit at Alvin, Tex., will be built by Humble Oil & Refining Co. in conjunction
with the Sweeny operation of Phillips Petroleum Co. and Houston Natural Gas
Corp. Mobil Pipe Line Co. was building a 134-mile, 3-, 4-, and 8.~inch gas
liquids pipeline between its 10-inch products line at Corsicana and its Chitwood,
Okla., gas plant. Suntide Pipeline Co. began construction of a 10-mile,